Sharing the Music
by Cruelest Sea
Summary: Reflections of love and life on Moonbase Alpha. Expansions for "The Immunity Syndrome" and "The Last Sunset". One shots: A Different Light; Unthinkable.
1. Unthinkable

**_Unthinkable_**

_"We understand death for the first time when he puts his hand upon one whom we love." - Madame de Stael_

The moment she sees him she's able to identify the feeling that's been swelling in her since the moment the Commander told her Tony was "sick, very sick". It's hope draining away, replaced by a cold finality of imminent loss, of raw fear.

She touches his cheek, trailing fingers to his jaw to turn his face to her, and he's cold, so cold, ice against her skin. His eyelids quiver open as he whispers her name in a tone more breath than voice.

She tries to smile at him, bravely, as if to reassure him that everything will be fine. But it won't be, she knows, she can see it in the dullness of his eyes, the frail whisper of her name.

The human body is so fragile, so easily broken and crushed. He's pale, so still. Massive shock, brain swelling. There's no damage, not yet, but he's dying as assuredly as if a laser blast has struck his heart.

The will to live is gone, snuffed out by a force beyond their understanding, out of the reach of communication. The creature - being - out there has stripped that will from him, leaving him a hollow shell, slowly withering away like flowers at the end of summer.

She can't fathom it, can't curl her mind around the concept of Tony dying. No matter how many times he falls, no matter how often she thinks he's lost, he always comes through, back on his feet with only a few cuts and scrapes to show the damage. He has luck that would be the envy of gamblers across the galaxies.

She's known him only a short time, really, but in empty space days are meaningless, hours shifting seamlessly into years, making the time seem forever.

For all her teasing, her flirting, he's the only person she loves with all her heart and soul, a human so different from her own kind, and yet more precious than anyone on her planet was to her.

His is the name she whispers in dreams, the arms she reaches for in delirium. And for all his light-hearted dancing around his feelings she doesn't doubt his love for her. It's written in his eyes, in his smile, in the hand that touches her, the arms that hold her when she cries, the gentle way he speaks her name. She doesn't need words.

To watch him die is unthinkable.

Because for all her abilities, the countless forms she can take, the unique molecular structure that allows her to understand and become almost every creature to aid in almost any situation, she can't save him.

And for all her logistical skills, the computer-like workings of her mind that can calculate a probability to within a millimetre of accuracy, she can't comprehend a life without him.


	2. A Different Light

**_A Different Light_**

_"If the sight of the blue skies fills you with joy, if a blade of grass springing up in the fields has power to move you, if the simple things of nature have a message that you understand, rejoice, for your soul is alive." - Eleonora Duse_

He sees it break away from the horizon, lifting toward the sky with deft strokes, an invisible artist's hand streaking the colors, changing each shade almost too quickly for his eyes to catch.

He focuses with all his strength, drilling his eyes into the sight, as if testing it for vision or mirage. When he realizes it's real his breath catches, heart slamming against his ribcage.

The sky is piercing red against vivid blue, colors unnaturally bright, off from the familiar tones and hues of earth. He feels tears seep into his eyes, salt burning, aching with the awe, the beauty. He finds he's holding his breath, as if intaking and exhaling air will distract him from the moment, that he'll miss a precious second.

It's a sunrise, the first one he's seen since Earth, glowing with hope and promise, and he longs to reach out and touch it, to wrap his hands and eyes in the colors and hold onto it forever. He wonders how many times he saw one before and never took any notice of it.

The others press their fingers and faces to the glass, but he holds back. As they run out he stays back, standing inside, looking through the glass until the sunrise fades into a clear blue sky. He's the commander, after all, and the commander can't leave his post, can't indulge in mindless pleasures when he holds the lives and safety of hundreds in his hands.

He doesn't go out.

oooOOOooo

He opens the windows and lets the air in, breathing deeply.

It's clean and fresh, not artificially circulated and filtered as they've breathed so long. It smells like country air, filling his lungs, bursting with life, and his heart swells with a quiet joy somewhere deep inside him.

The others go out in it as if on a beach on Earth, sun tanning, playing tennis. He fleetingly wishes he could join them. And then he reminds himself that he's the commander and it isn't his place to go out, to enjoy himself.

After a while he turns his back on the sights outside and returns to his work, the empty monitors and screens, the cold and sterile blinking buttons and the strips of lifeless paper. He doesn't look back out again.

But he leaves the windows open.

oooOOOooo

It's raining, such a simple and natural thing that he can't explain why hot tears spring to his eyes, or why his chest hurts.

It falls in sheets from the sky, and he wonders if it's warm or cool, whether it comes with the muggy heat of a summer storm or the gentle breeze softening its path. It blurs through his eyes, gentling his view of the land and for just an instant he imagines it's Earth, green and full of life, reaching out and welcoming, anything but the hard and rough land outside.

The others run out into the rain, laughing, dancing, splashing in it, reveling in the freedom, the memory of another time, of a home now gone.

He wants to join them, to hold the precious droplets in his hands, to feel it on his face, washing away the years, to drink it like the finest wine.

But he's the commander and he stays inside and only watches.

Watches and wonders what the rain tastes like.

oooOOOooo

He watches the sun slip behind the horizon, fading into the dust for the last time, slowly dying.

It's the last sunset in this world, and even if he hadn't known he would have sensed it anyway.

There's a horrible finality to it, a hideous beauty enfolding them, a dirge for faint hopes and lost dreams. They'll go on, seeking another place, chasing another hope. They may even find it.

But in that instant, as he watches that last sunset, all he can think is how he never saw the sunrise, never walked in the air, and never tasted the rain.

And those moments may have been the last chance in his life to do those things.


End file.
